It's No Fun For Candidates To Run In Osceola Races

COGITATIN'

The recent Kissimmee commission races were lucky to even draw opponents; in fact one seat didn't. In St. Cloud, they seem to line up to see who will run.

Why the big difference?

Some say the reason Kissimmee draws less interest is because the city officials are doing such a good job. I'll give you two guesses who offers that theory.

Even when Kissimmee had races, like the two recent ones, only 13.86 percent of the voters turned out.

Talk about voice of the people. I've heard of the silent majority. Could this be a case of the apathetic majority ? If so, why?

Across the canal, it's a different matter. Last month's election saw three candidates for each of the two seats, almost guaranteeing a runoff, which was the result. The election will be decided Tuesday, and I'll bet the turnout percentage will top that of Kissimmee's regular election.

St. Cloud voters turned out in good numbers for the first go-round, with 30.42 percent of the registered voters casting their ballots. That means that 416 more people voted in St. Cloud than in Kissimmee, and St. Cloud has more than 5,000 fewer voters.

There's no such thing as silence in Cloud City. There is politics down and dirty.

In fact, therein lies the problem. St. Cloud voters, or at least a large group of them, seem to get too carried away with the election process.

Last-minute ''mystery letters'' are mailed to voters, some containing a touch of truth, others misrepresenting the facts. Verbal potshots at candidates and other officials are the order of the day, election season or not. Solid issues are rarely the points of attack.

Right or wrong, this sort of politics seems to get the voters stirred up and out to the polls.

Why all the interest in St. Cloud? Some say it's because there are a lot of retired people who don't have anything better to do. Once again I'll give you two guesses as to who offers that theory.

Wouldn't it be nice if somehow we could strike a happy medium between the two? It sure would be nice to see interesting elections in both cities and voters actually exercising their duty.

Both cities are faced with enough problems; they don't need an electorate that is adding to that list.